Saturday, August 6, 2011

Connecting to Fox Harbour Library, Newfoundland

Photo: Fox Harbour from Newfoundland art

Catherine Murray, a librarian at Fox Harbour, Newfoundland, agreed last month to an interesting experiment.

A direct island-to-island communication from one coast to the other, the exercise was organized as part of the Write on Bowen Festival. Writers Ellee Kraljii Gardiner and Michael Turner provided the writing constraints -- and the envelopes, addressed to Catherine at Fox Harbour Libary.

We only had a few minutes, and each writer in the room came up with a very different response to the prompts, as we learned when a few people read their work afterwards.

It was an interesting use of writing prompts and libraries. Next time I go to Newfoundland, I hope to visit the small library at Fox Harbour. Perhaps I'll meet Catherine Murray herself.